Week three is in the books and we remain heavily blue-blood at the top of the polls. We were treated to a couple really fun ranked matchups that debuts a couple of new teams in the Top 5 of our rankings. Let’s get to a recap of this past week and a look forward to week four.
18 Stripes Top 20 Poll
| RANK | TEAM | RECORD | LAST WEEK |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Alabama | 3-0 | 62-7 W vs. Ole Miss |
| 2 | Georgia | 3-0 | 49-7 W vs. MTSU |
| 3 | Clemson | 3-0 | 38-7 W vs. Georgia Southern |
| 4 | LSU (+5) | 3-0 | 22-21 W vs. Auburn |
| 5 | Ohio State (+2) | 3-0 | 40-28 W vs. TCU |
| 6 | Oklahoma (-1) | 3-0 | 37-27 W vs. Iowa State |
| 7 | Stanford (-1) | 3-0 | 30-10 W vs. UC Davis |
| 8 | Penn State (+6) | 3-0 | 63-10 W vs. Kent State |
| 9 | Notre Dame (+3) | 3-0 | 22-17 W vs. Vanderbilt |
| 10 | UCF | 2-0 | Game Cancelled |
| 11 | West Virginia (+2) | 2-0 | Game Cancelled |
| 12 | Auburn (-8) | 2-1 | 22-21 L vs. LSU |
| 13 | TCU (-2) | 2-1 | 40-28 L vs. Ohio State |
| 14 | Washington (-1) | 2-1 | 21-7 W vs. Utah |
| 15 | Michigan (-2) | 2-1 | 45-20 W vs. SMU |
| 16 | Oklahoma State (NR) | 3-0 | 44-21 W vs. Boise State |
| 17 | Wisconsin (+9) | 2-1 | 24-21 L vs. BYU |
| 18 | Miss State | 3-0 | 56-10 W vs. Louisiana |
| 19 | Miami | 2-1 | 49-24 W vs. Toledo |
| 20 | Virginia Tech (+4) | 2-0 | Game Cancelled |
Out: Boise State
In: Oklahoma State
Alabama has already played a pair of Power 5 teams and is currently +142 in point differential. I believe Florida State’s title-winning 2013 squad set the NCAA record at +553 and the Tide might make a good run at that mark this year. Alabama also extended their NCAA record 76 straight wins over unranked teams–now 3 better than Florida’s run from 1990 until 2000.
Speaking of which, after losing to 16 unranked teams in 38 overall appearances as Pitt’s head coach, Paul Chryst just suffered his first unranked loss in his 44th game at Wisconsin. That’s a tough blow but the Badgers are fortunate to be able to build a resume with Michigan and Penn State coming up from the much stronger East division.
LSU is now carrying two wins over ranked teams which moves them way up my rankings. I’m still a little reluctant to think they are a playoff contender based on an average offense but more importantly they still have plenty of tough games coming up.
I’m putting my bias aside and willing to admit Penn State is really good again. They had a head-scratcher in the opener but have looked dominant since then.
Mike Gundy is among my favorite coaches and once again he has Oklahoma State flying quietly under the radar and possibly poised to start 9-0 before a super fun November against 3 currently ranked Big 12 teams.
Following this early-season implosion of Florida State I’ve moved Virginia Tech down quite a bit while the Coaches Poll has them at 10th! That win might turn out to be a mirage and a pretty average loss for the Seminoles. It would seem the Hokies are going to be undefeated when the Irish visit Blacksburg unless they trip up at Duke beforehand.
Week 4 Games to Watch
FAU (+13.5) at UCF – One of the top G5 games of the year took a hit after Florida Atlantic looked quite poor in a David vs. Goliath battle against Oklahoma to start the season. The Owls have given up 55 points in their other 2 games and I’m not sure Kiffin has the horses on defense to keep up in this one. Knights win 39-24.
TCU (-3) at Texas – Someone may be able to track the line history as it would seem week 3 moved this considerably following Texas’ stomping of USC. In my pre-season previews this was one of my biggest games for the Big 12 and I like TCU coming off a tough loss and the Horns getting a little complacent after a big win. Horned Frogs win 33-28.
Texas Tech (+13) at Oklahoma State – Have you watched Texas Tech? They have a true freshman low 3-star quarterback who has 1,160 yards at 70.7% with 8 touchdowns and no picks already. How is this not a classic Big 12 shootout with touchdowns for days? Cowboys win 49-44.
Florida (-4.5) at Tennessee – I have not watched a second of Tennessee this year, nary a highlight. Can anyone fill me in on their progress? They hung around with West Virginia for a bit (I did see some of that game come to think of it!) so maybe they play decent at home against a decidedly unproven Gators team? Gators win 28-24.Â
Texas A&M (+27) at Alabama – Hilarious. Crimson Tide win 52-18.
*Game of the Week* Stanford (-2) at Oregon – This week’s GameDay location will fill in a piece to the puzzle in the Pac-12 North. Visiting Autzen used to be kyrptonite for Stanford (1-6 record in recent times) until winning 2 out of their last 3 visits. It would be so Stanford-y to lose this and turn and beat Notre Dame, wouldn’t it? Cardinal win 30-26.
Wisconsin (-3.5) at Iowa – Perhaps the Badgers received a nice wake-up call last week? I have to think they are going to be very ornery this weekend. Badgers win 37-17.
Last Week:
3-4 SU, 4-3 ATS
Season:
16-9 SU, 12-13 ATS
This seems like the place to enjoy that USC has a transitive loss to FCS Villanova.
Nova beat Temple.
Temple beat Maryland.
Maryland beat Texas.
Texas beat USC.
If USC isn’t going to count as a quality win for us we might as well enjoy watching them lose.
There is a bright spot this season!
There is NEVER a USC loss that I fail to enjoy.
First of all, A+ title of this article.
Second, if life was fair and karma was real Urban Meyer would lose to Tulane this weekend…Alas.
A-. Would be a + if it was the “Week 20 College Football Paul, Oh for Chryst’s Sake”
College football this year feels like the NBA the past few seasons. Bama is Golden State (Tua is them adding KD). Clemson is whatever team in the east Lebron is on. Georgia is the Thunder/San Antonio/Rockets (in Bama’s conference, can compete with them, but in the end, they aren’t Bama). All the other decent teams are like the East, some combo of Celtics/Raptors/76ers/whoever else. Fun, young teams that are competing with each other for that 1 seed (playoff berth), but in the end will lose to Lebron, who will lose to GSW.
That’s a great analogy. Probably makes Notre Dame the Washington Wizards- a couple decent enough pieces but no real threat or hope of taking out better teams.
But that’s in the national scope of things, if they can get 10+ wins for 3 of the last 4 seasons that would be quite an accomplishment considering where the program has been post-Holtz.
I buy the Wizards. And we have Nicco Fertitta as our Kelly Oubre (suspended for the big hit on Kelly Olynyk 2 years ago), because Fertitta gets suspended for big hits a lot, right?
So far this season feels like 4 teams Plus 1 plus everyone else. Oklahoma clearly top 5 team but IMO a notch below the top 4. Watched their game this weekend and they are so soft defensively, nowhere near the talent of the top 4.
From our perspective I agree another 10 win season would be huge, a long way off, but would put us in that next echelon of teams (penn state, wisky, uw, Stanford)
That’s pretty much my feeling too. I’d probably put Bama all alone in their tier:
Tier 1 – Bama
(small gap) Tier 2 – Clemson, UGA, tOSU
(big gap) Tier 3 – Oklahoma, LSU?
(massive gap) Tier 4 – Most of the other unbeatens plus Auburn?
I didn’t see much of the LSU game but I’m just not sure if what they are doing is sustainable. We’ll see because that schedule is brutal.
I continue to fail to see whatever others are seeing in Oklahoma. The main complaint against ND is that they don’t put bad teams away, but (winless) Iowa State had the ball in the fourth quarter in Oklahoma territory with a chance to tie when the Sooners got a game sealing interception. They can slum it in the tier with the rest of us.